Technology Briefing

Published 10:00 pm, Wednesday, August 15, 2007

REGIONAL NEWS

CombiMatrix breaks away from Acacia Research

Mukilteo-based CombiMatrix Corp., a biotech company, on Wednesday split from its former majority owner, becoming an independent, publicly traded company with a market capitalization of $45 million and 80 employees, 55 of them in Mukilteo.

"We wished to become independent because our businesses are very different," said CombiMatrix President and Chief Executive Amit Kumar.

CombiMatrix's former owner, Newport Beach, Calif.-based Acacia Research Co., buys intellectual property such as patents and licenses it to other companies. CombiMatrix makes technology to help researchers study gene-based diseases.

CombiMatrix now trades on the Nasdaq market under the symbol CBMXD. The symbol will change in 20 days to CBMX to denote that the company is no longer considered "new." It has traded under the symbol CBMX since December 2002, but as a tracking stock of Acacia's. Now it will trade as an independent company.

Shares of CBMXD closed up $4.90, or 817 percent, at $5.50. Shares of Acacia, traded under the symbol ACTG, closed down 7 cents, or 0.6 percent, at $11.19.

Hotmail users to get 5 gigabytes of storage

Microsoft Corp. soon will let users of its Hotmail service store 5 gigabytes of photos and other e-mail messages, more than double the previous limit.

Microsoft said Hotmail also will get faster in coming weeks thanks to performance improvements. E-mail users also will see a new "report phishing" button and a way to combine duplicate contacts in the address book.

Cell Therapeutics to take over U.S. sales of cancer drug

Biotech firm Cell Therapeutics Inc. on Thursday will announce plans to pay Biogen Idec up to $30 million for a lymphoma cancer treatment.

Cell Therapeutics will take over sales, marketing and development of Zevalin in the U.S., while Bayer Schering will continue to sell the drug outside the country. Zevalin posted sales of $15.4 million in the U.S. last year as a treatment for patients with relapsed non-Hodgkin's lymphoma.

Upon terms of the agreement, Cell Therapeutics will pay Biogen $10 million in cash and up to $20 million in milestone payments when the product receives approval for an additional use. The company will hold a press conference at 8:30 a.m. Thursday to provide details.

NATIONAL NEWS

Dell wins contract to provide the VA's desktop computers

Dell Inc., the world's second- largest personal-computer maker, will be the exclusive provider of desktop computers to the Veterans Affairs Department in a contract valued at more than $248 million.

Dell will lease at least 249,000 computers to the department over three years, the Round Rock, Texas-based company said Wednesday in a prepared statement. Dell also will install and manage the machines for the agency's more than 200,000 employees.

The contract bolsters Dell's desktop business, which accounted for 33 percent of sales in the first quarter ended May 4. Desktop-computer sales fell 6 percent from a year earlier as more customers bought notebook PCs. The deal also helps lift Dell's services business, one of its fastest-growing units.

SEC may sue Take-Two over backdated stock options

The company, maker of the "Grand Theft Auto" games, received a "Wells" notice Aug. 9 that the agency staff will seek authority to file a complaint and seek monetary damages, New York-based Take-Two said Wednesday in a regulatory filing.

Former Chief Executive Ryan Brant was sentenced this month to five years of probation in New York state court after pleading guilty to falsifying records. Former general counsel Kenneth Selterman and former Chief Accounting Officer Patti Tay also pleaded guilty and got probation.